Why Community?: Moving Beyond Compassion
When I originally starting thinking and writing about community, I was motivated by one observation in particular. I’d seen community after community happily trucking along, but if you looked at any individual member, they were drained, tired, and overworked. The community wasn’t serving them; they were serving the community. Now, I think there are times of give and take and balance isn’t necessarily complete fairness at all times, but this wasn’t a one-off thing. It was a consistent pattern I was seeing.
I kept asking myself, “Do we just exist to pour ourselves out to keep these communities going? Or are we going about it wrong and not requiring the communities to enrich the lives of the people in them?” I don’t mean in some existential way - if you’re in a community, your life should be measurably better because of that community. I thought the key to that enrichment was compassion. It seems so obvious, right? We do nice things for each other and so then we’re all happier. But as I began to think, and read, and explore, I realized that the true benefits of community just started with compassionate care.
Because we can get meals from any number of local charities, and nonprofits offer mental health services, and any random person on the internet can cheer us up when we’re down (or even a cat video, if it comes to that). The connections are what make the compassion powerful, because they start to change how we see the world.
Kindness isn’t a commodity, and it isn’t a service. It’s something that we give and take from each other as a gift. The world is not inherently harsh and it is not hard. That’s just a lie perpetuated by those who want to make it ok to hurt other people. In fact, the more connected you get, the more you see pain, but the more you see a world teeming with kind acts. When I saw people stepping up for their neighbors again and again – not on some internet video, but real-life people you know – when I saw that, community did enrich me.
And from there, I began to be able to see the joy in the midst of pain. Not because I was somehow glossing over the hurt, despair, and very real problems of our world, but because my community helped me to remember that just as much joy, kindness, and ingenuity exists, if only we know where to look.
How has your community helped you? Where are you seeing joy and kindness in community today?
